Apr 19, 2010

As I was contemplating some (recently unearthed) issues that have haunted me over the years, it occurred to me that I have a strong desire to step back and address some things that might sound like old issues, but have not been resolved to the satisfaction of either me, or some other person(s) within my sphere of influence.

I don't believe that all of the issues I have in mind can be agreed upon fully, but I have been considering the usefulness of continuing to discuss even "resolved" social issues in order to ensure that we don't repeat mistakes from our past. Mistakes are, admittedly, human and inevitable, but maybe through further discussion they can be lessened in scope or frequency. Mistake might not even be the right word...perhaps "misunderstanding".

Within my humble experiences I have noticed an extreme variance on the opinions of people whom I know on issues of culture, faith, and social justice. Rather than divide my life into pockets of people whom can agree with me on "this issue" or "that stance" this will be an attempt to at least blur these divisions a bit more, and bring a stronger sense of unity to my life through my relationships, and perhaps even more peace of mind for myself by acknowledging more "Truth".

The obvious first bullet points for me would be to address what I would like to call "blasphemous icons" and the issue of nudity. However, as I was recently reminded, as a Christian it is a good idea for me to "start at the cross" in all things. How I interpret this "starting point" has profound implications to the issues which I hope to address. Namely, that if I am a person who believes that a man, who claimed to be God, sacrificed him self through the most grotesque execution imaginable for each and every evil that each and every human has done or thought...then my assumption is that God is not at-all afraid of the grotesque, or the things that we humans think to do with ourselves. The value-judgment then becomes not "will this offend God?" but "Will this bring man closer to God by revealing or reflecting some truth about Him"

What other kinds of truths about God might be revealed or reflected in culture, faith, and social justice? This is only the starting point for my discussion, so I leave you with that question. I hope to continue to discuss these things with you.